


Cinch

by sabinelagrande



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Cassandra de Rolo Is Done With Your Shit, Corsetry, Established Relationship, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 20:21:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8223623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabinelagrande/pseuds/sabinelagrande
Summary: Vex has her first encounter with Whitestone's high fashion.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to pearwaldorf for looking this over!

Vex has been a baroness for several months before her services are actually needed; by the skin of their collective teeth, they have somehow pulled through the violence of the Conclave and come out the other side. Thus, it's a time of rejoicing, and Whitestone is no exception.

As luck would have it, it also happens to be the time of a feast of Pelor, and the city is getting ready for an almighty one. Vox Machina is getting ready too, but especially Percy and Vex; Vex was recently set upon by a lot of people carrying a lot of fabric, but she managed to get out of it with most of her dignity intact.

Arrayed and only slightly stunned, she goes to find Percy; the door to his room is ajar, light coming through it into the hallway.

"Brace yourself," she hears Cassandra say.

"I'm braced," Percy replies.

"Three, two, one," Cassandra counts, then there are the sounds of some kind of struggle, furniture scraping against the floor. "I said brace!"

"I can't very well brace the sofa and myself at the same time," Percy snaps, which is about the time Vex gets to the door.

It takes a moment for Vex to even process what she's seeing; Percy has his hands on the back of a small sofa while Cassandra stands behind him. Over his shirt he's wearing what looks like a normal waistcoat, only it's split all the way up in the back, held together with laces that Cassandra is currently tugging on. Both of them look up when she steps in, giving her very similar annoyed glances.

"Have you ever laced a corset before?" Cassandra demands, looking at Vex.

"Yes," Vex replies, though she's not sure she wants to get in the middle of what's going on here.

"Congratulations," Cassandra says, dropping the laces and walking out. "You're being pressed into service by Whitestone, so that I don't undo everyone's good work by murdering my brother."

For a moment Percy looks like he's going to stop her, but instead he rolls his eyes, sighing. "Impossible woman."

"What are you wearing?" Vex asks, walking over to him.

"Formal dress," Percy says, offering nothing further. 

Vex raises an eyebrow. "That much is clear."

Percy sighs. "A mess of boning and laces that is probably pushing all my internal organs out of alignment."

"Is this the noble fashion of Whitestone?" Vex says, running her hand over the front of the corset, which is in the softest reddish-brown suede, held together by bronze clasps.

"For the last hundred and fifty years or so, but I am entertaining all ideas for new men's attire," he says.

"I didn't know they made corsets for men, short of girdles," she tells him.

"A corset enhances regal bearing and prevents being caught in a slouch at an inauspicious time," Percy says, like he's reciting from a book.

"Who told you that?" Vex asks.

"I heard it about a hundred times as a teenager," he says, which explains a lot. "This is-" He stops, looking down; he adjusts his cuffs, but Vex can tell he just wants something to do with his hands. "Cassandra and I were both prepared from a young age, but we're really only doing this for the first time. There's been a lot of change, so we thought it best if we stuck to tradition for the window dressing."

Vex lays a hand on the side of his face. "No one will fault you for it, darling, least of all me." She looks him over. "Need a hand?"

"If you wouldn't mind," Percy says. 

"Not at all," Vex says, making a spinning motion with her finger, and Percy turns around.

"For the record, Cassandra has no actual idea of how to lace a corset," Percy says. "So if it's a mess back there, I had nothing to do with it."

Vex gets a look at the situation; it is a bit of a mess, but it's fixed easily enough. "I'm not much more of an expert than your sister, but there's really not very far to go," she tells him. "Hang on to the bedpost and I'll do the rest."

"If I had a gold piece for every time I've heard that one," Percy says dryly, but he does as she says.

Vex adjusts the laces, tugging strategically instead of just yanking, bringing the corset together little by little. "How tight do you want this?" she asks. 

"Just enough to get the laces in all the holes and tie them off," Percy says, already sounding a little breathless.

"Then we're almost there," Vex says. "Hold on."

She has to pull then, calculated but still with force, one foot up on the bedstead for leverage. Percy is trying to stay in place, but with only moderate success; his body shifts as she pulls on the laces, the clench of the corset dictating his movements. It's appealing, the way she can just move him around like this, like he's just a plaything. She doesn't know what that says about her, but she might as well go with it.

They're getting closer, and Vex runs a hand up his back, feeling along the line of grommets for any bumps. The satin is warm from his skin, and she takes another moment to feel it, rising and falling slightly as he breathes. There's something intimate about it; perhaps that's an odd thing to think given that she took this task over from Percy's sister, but her relationship to Percy is decidedly not sisterly. 

"Just a little bit more," she says, putting the laces through their last holes. Percy makes a slight noise as she pulls again, and she freezes. "Darling?" she says, putting a hand on his shoulder. "If it's hurting, I'm going to stop."

"You just surprised me," Percy says. "Really, I'm fine."

"One more pull, alright?" Vex says. "Then I'm stopping."

Percy grips the bedpost tighter. "Do your worst."

With one last effort, Vex manages to get enough slack out of the laces to tie them off. "Finished," she says, stepping back, and Percy releases his hold on the bed, standing up straight. "Can you breathe?"

Percy takes a breath and lets it out. "Sort of," he says.

"Don't start running laps around the castle and you'll probably be fine," Vex says, taking his coat from where it waits on the bed and handing it to him. Percy pulls it on, and if Vex hadn't seen underneath it, she'd never know something was different. Maybe that's not quite true; he looks like he's maybe half an inch taller and, obviously, a good bit trimmer around the midsection.

"Let's just keep this between us, shall we?" Percy says. "I'm not exactly ashamed, but I do shudder to think what Grog and Scanlan would make of it."

Vex gives him a wink. "It'll be our little secret, darling."

There's a pause.

"Are you getting off on this?" Percy asks, bemused.

"Maybe a little," Vex admits. "Are you not?"

"I never really considered it," he says. "It was always an unfortunate necessity, not something I did for fun."

"Well, if you wanted," Vex says, stepping closer and settling her hands on his waist, "we could have a little fun later."

"That will give me something so much nicer to think about during this whole affair," Percy says.

Vex hooks a finger into the top of the corset, pulling him down easily and kissing him. "Don't think about it too hard. You get a faraway look in your eyes."

"Everyone else will just think I'm thinking about firearms," he says.

"They are very similar looks," she allows. She gives him a once over. "Well, it may be a slightly ridiculous garment, but you do make it look good."

"You haven't begun to see Whitestone's truly ridiculous traditional garments," Percy says, stepping around her and towards the hallway. "Wait until you see your armor for the Grey Hunt."

"Wait, what?" Vex says, following him out the door.


End file.
